

Conditjoncliivitini, 







RALTCIRH, U. C. 



er 






COTTON 

IN 

THE 

FIELD 




AND 

IN 
THE 
BALE. 




FARMING. 



JSTorth Carolina is essentially an agTicultiiral State. While she 
has developed in manufacturing in the last decade more than any 
other State in the Union, the increase in this line having been over 
800 per cent, the greatest increase is in cotton manufacturing, which 
is largely due to the fact that the farmers of the State are largely 
engaged in the culture of this staple. To the large area in tobacco, 
too, is due the gTeat development of the State in the manufacture of 
tobacco, and her unequalled forests of hardwoods have tended to the 
building up of a great woodworking industry. 

Hence we come back to the soil as the source of the wealth and 
development of North Carolina. There is no State in the Union, 
unless we except California, which has such a varied series of crops, 
owing to the great range of climate. Uying largely on the great 
undulating plain sloping from the mountains to the sea, and from 
the greatest elevation east of the Rockies down to the coast plain but 
little elevated above the sea-level, N'orth Carolina greets the rising 
sun, and her climate varies according to the elevation. On the high 
plateaus of the northwestern part of the State we find a gTass and 
grazing section with cattle on .a thousand hills, and the forest gi-owth 
of white-pine, hemlock, and fir resembling Canada. Dropping over 
the great escarpment of the Blue Ridge, we reach the undulating 
region of the piedmont country, which in this State is again divided 
into upper and lower piedmont by a range of hills a hundred or so 
miles east of the Blue Ridge and forming the falls of the rivers 
wuth wonderful water-powers. This section lies in a series of roll- 
ing uplands, intersected by the rivers with their fertile bottom- 
lands and rising from 700 to 1,500 feet elevation at the foot of 
the Blue Ridge. East of the Uwharrie Mountains and the Occo- 
ueechee Hills there is still the same rolling upland extending east- 
ward till it drops off into the level coastal plain which extends 
inward for more than a hundred miles from the ocean. This lower 
piedmont, from its lesser elevation, has a milder winter climate than 
the upper piedmont, and the upper piedmont is far warmer in winter 
than the mountain region between the Blue Ridge and the Great 
Smokies that separate the State from Tennessee. As we reach the 
lower coast we find that instead of the white-pines and hemlocks of 
the high mountain plateaus and valleys, we have the first touch of 
the Floridian vegetation in the cabbage-palms which tower among the 
other evergreen growth on Smith's Island at the moutli of the Cape 
Fear River. This wide-stret«hing area from the white-pine to the 
palms shows the wonderful variety of climates which the State pos- 
sesses, and accordingly indicates her adaptation to the crops of the 
N'orth and the South. The gi-assy uplands of the mountain country 



4 Farming. 

are as well adapted to the grazing of cattle as any part of the coun- 
try, while the abundant food crops of the piedmont section offer the 
greatest opportunities for the winter feeding of these mountain- 
raised cattle. Over a very large section of the piedmont and coast 
regions the cotton crop has long been the chief interest of the farmers, 
and when grown in good farming there is no money crop in the 
United States that can equal it for average profit. True, it has 
been allowed to too much absorb the attention of the farmers, and 
has been grown almost as a sole crop on too many farms. But there 
is a gradual awakening to the importance of good farming with cot- 
ton, and good farmers who have realized the importance of a good 
rotation of crops are finding out the value of such a rotation and are 
understanding that there are other crops that can be grown with 
profit as well as cotton, and that through the aid of these crops and 
the great clover of tlie South, the cow-pea, they can gTow cotton with 
a greater yield per acre, and can get just as much cotton on a smaller 
area as they could from the larger under the old system of merely 
planting cotton. 

There is too much of a tendency among farmers coming here from 
the ISTorth to ignore cotton and to go into other crops to the exclusion 
of cotton. JSTorthern men coming South are too apt to attribute the 
worn and wasted condition of much of the upland soil to the cultiva- 
tion of cotton, and they imagine that cotton is a very exhaustive 
crop, while the very reverse is true, for, so far as the lint is concerned, 
there is no crop grown that draws so lightly on the fertility of the 
soil as cotton, and when the seed are properly applied to the rational 
feeding of cattle and the return of the manure to the soil in a good 
rotation of crops, there is no crop with which the land can be more 
rapidly improved than in the cultivation of cotton. ISTo good farmer, 
coming to a new location, can afford to ignore what has been long 
proved to be the best money crop of the section. 

The same remarks will apply to the northern counties east of the 
Blue Eidge, where the tobacco crop has long taken the place of cotton. 
Single cropping with tobacco is as bad as single cropping with cotton, 
and rotative farming and the improvement of the land can be done 
as well with tobacco as the money crop as with cotton. 

The gTeatest development in the cultivation of the soil has been 
made in the coastal plain, where immense areas are now devoted to 
the production of early vegetable crops for the N"orthern market and 
the growing of strawberries and other small fruits. The truckers of 
the eastern part of the State are the most progTessive cultivators we 
have, and they are annually improving their production and adopting 
intensive methods with protection and artificial heat during the win- 
ter months for the production of crops ahead of the natural season. 
With a soil unsurpassed for the purpose and a climate that makes it 
easy to produce extra early crops, the business has prospered and is 
increasing annually. But there is room in all parts of the State for 



Fakming. 



the general farmer in wheat, oats, grasses and cattle, and for the 
fruit-gi'ower in the long-leaf pine country who w'ishes to gTow 
peaches on a large scale, while the mountain country is destined to 
he soon recognized as the greatest apple section of the United States. 
In the following pages we will treat of the various crops and the 



regions of the State best suited to them. 



The soil surveys of the Department of Agriculture in Washington 
have demonstrated that our upland red-clay soils are practically 
identical with the best wheat soils in the country. They call the red- 
clay "Cecil Clay," from the fact that they first met with it in the 
northern part of Cecil County in Maryland, where on it the finest 
crops of wheat and grass produced in this country are gTOwn. Cecil 
County hay is the standard hay in the Baltimore market. That this 
red clay here is capable of making as good crops of wheat here as in 
Maryland has been abundantly proved, though the general neglect of 
wheat for exclusive cotton growing has led people to think that wheat 
is hardly worth attention as a sale crop. This impression is due, 
not to the land, but to the kind of farming that has been done. All the 
rolling uplands of the piedmont section (and this means the greater 
part of the State) are admirably adapted to wheat growing, clover, 
and the feeding of cattle. One Ohio farmer who came to the pied- 
mont country from the blue-grass, said recently tliat he has better 
summer pasture here than in Ohio, since the blue-gi'ass dries up in 
the summer heat, while here the natural growth of the Japan clover, 
that has spread all over the piedmont country, is at its best in 
the hot summer weather, and cattle thrive on it as they do not on the 
blue-grass at that season. This man is a large breeder of the Polled 
Angus cattle, and is well satisfied with his change. With a rotation 
consisting of corn, with all the home-made manure, followed by 
wheat, with simply a good application of the cheap acid phosphate, 
and the wheat followed at once with a crof) of cow-peas for hay and 
the pea stubble prepared for cotton the next season, with a liberal 
application of fertilizer, and crimson clover sown among the cotton, 
the soil will rapidly improve, for then there will be a clover sod to 
plow under with the manure for the corn and the land will be in the 
best possible condition for tlie following wheat croj), and the peas 
after the wheat will not only give a large amount of valuable feed 
for stock, but the stubble will be the best possible preparation for the 
cotton crop. We know of one fanner, who is not in the best wheat 
section, but in the best cotton section, who has been practising this 
mode of farming, and last season (1904) he made 100 bales of cot- 
ton on 50 acres. Even at the price for cotton as we now write (about 
seven and a half cents per pound), what money crop can compare 
with cotton when produced in this Avay, for the value of the seed 



6 Farming. 

will largely increase the value of the 1,000 pounds of cotton per acre, 
while the auxiliary crops of wheat, oats, and hay leave the cotton crop 
almost a free money crop. AVheat, therefore, should always enter 
into the rotation of a farm in the red-clay uplands of the piedmont 
section. In this same section there are broad river bottom-lands, 
such as those along the Yadkin and Catawba rivers, which have 
been for generations carelessly cultivated in corn only, but are among 
the best of wheat lands and can well be taken into the rotation sug- 
gested, and from their great natural fertility can soon be made to 
produce immense crops. In the years before the Civil AVar the white 
wheat of l^orth Carolina was famous and the States north of us — as 
far north as Maryland — were in the habit of sending here for seed 
wheat. Since the war the exclusive devotion to cotton as the only 
means for recovering the losses of the war has led to the neglect of 
the wheat crop. But the piedmont soils are naturally as well adapted 
to it as ever, and it only needs good rotative farming to demonstrate 
their capacity. While the coastal plain, with its lighter soils, is not 
so well adapted to wheat as the piedmont country, nevertheless good 
farmers have made fine crops of wheat in that section on the heavier 
soils. A few years ago Mr. Daughtridge of Edgecombe County, after 
harvesting a good crop of cotton, sowed wheat on the cotton land and 
made a crop of more tlian 30 bushels per acre. This would not be 
considered a poor crojD by any means in the best wheat-gTowing sec- 
tions of Maryland, where wheat is the main money crop. But in 
the coastal plain and on the lighter soil the crop that can more profita- 
bly take the place of wheat is 

WINTER OATS. 

Prom Pennsylvania southward there is no crop more uncertain 
than the spring-sown crop of oats, and in the South it is uniformly 
of little value, since the heat of summer strikes it before maturity 
and the grain is small and light. But with winter oats the case is 
different. They make their growth during the cool season of the year 
and mature before the hottest weather comes, and thus they keep up 
to and often above the standard weight per bushel, and under good 
culture yield large crops. Crops of 60 to 75 bushels per acre have 
been gTown under good rotation conditions. While winter oats can 
be g-rown all over the piedmont country, wheat is there far more cer- 
tain and profitable. But in the coast plain the reverse is true, and the 
oats should more generally be grown, except where soil conditions 
especially favor the wheat. The turning under of a crop of crimson 
clover on which the manure of the farm has been spread broadcast 
for corn, and the subsequent culture of the corn crop, makes the best 
possible preparation for the crop of winter oats. Early sowing is of 
great importance with this crop, and as the early planted corn can 
be cut easily here by the last of August and put into shock-rows, the 



Faeming. 7 

land can be disked and prepared so that the oats can go into the 
ground early in September. Sown at this time, they get well started 
and tillered before winter and will make in all the coast plain an 
abundant crop nnder good farming, and at the nsual price for oats in 
the Sonth will be found to be a profitable crop. As in the case of 
wheat, the land can at once be sown after harvest with cow-peas for 
hay and a crop of the finest hay for stock produced. Then if the 
acid phosphate and potash have been applied to the pea crop this crop 
wall not only be largely increased, but will store still more fertility in 
the soil for the following crop of cotton, which in this case will need 
only a similar fertilizer, since the peas Avill leave abundant nitrogen 
in the soil. Then crimson clover following the cotton will again 
increase the capacity of the soil for the production of corn. Peas 
can also be well sown among the corn, but will have to be mown after 
the corn is cut in order that the land may be gotten into good shape 
for the oats. The best variety of oats is the one known as Virginia 
Grey Winter Turf Oats. 



Corn grows well in all sections of the State, though in the high 
mountain plateaus of the northwest section a quick-gTOwing, variety 
is needed, as in the Xorth, for the farms there lie over 3,000 feet 
above the sea and are mainly devoted to gTass. While south of what 
is called the '^Corn Belt," we can gTow all over the piedmont and 
coast regions as heavy crops as are grown anywhere. The scanty 
crops to be seen in various sections are due, not to the lack of capacity 
in the soil for the production of corn, but to the careless mode of cul- 
tivation. In some parts of the coastal plain there are deep peaty 
soils of wide area on which great crops of corn are grown year after 
year just as they are gTown in the West. The traveler on the rail- 
road leading from Xorfolk, Va., to Edenton, J^. C, seeing the Avidc- 
spread corn-fields and the black soil, could well imagine himself on 
the black lands of Illinois. And these lands are as well adapted to 
grass and stock as the lands of the West, and when pro])erly farmed 
will be found among the most productive corn, oat, and gTass lands 
that can be found, while the cotton and truck crops can be increased 
by the same good farming. These black soils naturally grow up in 
a gTcat profusion of grasses as soon as left idle, and over half a cen- 
tury ago the late Edmund Euffin wrote in the book on eastern North 
Carolina that in his opinion that coast section was destined to be the 
greatest stock country on the Atlantic coast, because of the wonder- 
ful profusion of native grasses. From Ruffin's day down the farmers 
have been engaged in killing grass for the single culture of corn or 
cotton. When the gi-eat swamps in the coast plain are finally drained 
and opened up, as sections of them have been, there will be found 
the greatest corn section of its size in the United States. All over 
cotton and tobacco sections corn has been looked upon merely in the 
3 



8 Farming. 

notion of ''supplies" to enable the farmer to make more cotton or 
tobacco, and the idea of corn as a sale crop lias never been considered 
except in the peaty reclaimed swamp land of the eastern section, 
where single farmers "annually produce many thousands of bushels, 
one grower in the swamp country of Virginia, near the l^orth Caro- 
lina line, shipping 40,000 bushels of corn annually. How many 
farmers in the great corn belt do this ? The practice of the cotton 
growers in the piedmont section has long been to confine their com 
to the fertile bottom-lands, while all the upland is devoted to the 
cotton crop. On the bottom-lands, of course, the superior fertility 
and moisture of the soil enables them to grow moderate crops of corn, 
but even on these lands the crop is not what it should be made if some 
system of rotation was practiced ; and the fact that the uplands can 
be made to produce the largest of crops of corn has been abundantly 
demonstrated at the jSTorth Carolina College of Agriculture and 
Mechanic Arts, where on a natural upland soil a crop of 88 bushels 
of corn per acre was grown after but few years of rotative farming, 
and without any extravagant expenditure. 

Since the raising and feeding of live-stock lies at the very founda- 
tion of successful farming, no matter what the money crop may be, 
it is evident that in any improving rotation in the State the corn 
crop must be one of the crops in the rotation, and the more of it that 
is fed on the farm to stock the greater will be the profit in the crop 
itself and the more it will aid in the improvement of the soil for the 
money crop through the manure made from the feeding. 

Gradually, in various parts of the State, farmers are coming to 
realize the importance of the corn crop for the making of ensilage, 
and here and there, especially with those near the larger towns who 
are engaged in dairying, silos are being built and used, and with the 
silo of course come the stock to eat the silage. 

Corn is especially the crop needing humus in the soil, and hence 
it succeeds best on the moist and fertile bottom soils and on the 
black, sandy, and peaty soils of the coast region. But with good 
farming in a rotation in which peas or clover come in frequently on 
the land, and are fed to stock and the manure applied to the corn- 
field, there is no part of the State in which large crops of corn cannot 
be grown. The long growing season, especially on the coastal plain, 
makes the special selection of seed for earliness needless. In fact, 
early varieties of corn are not so productive as the later kinds, and 
are not needed here except in the high mountain plateau of the north- 
western section. It is a common practice all over the State to sow 
cow-peas among the corn at last working. These do not damage the 
corn at all and are of help to the soil, and, where no small grain is to 
follow the corn, crimson clover seed can be sown among the pea-vines, 
as the leaves fall in September, and will make, with the dead peas, 
an admirable green manure crop for cotton in the spring. 



Farming. ^ 9 

There is another advantage of the long growing season in the east- 
ern coast plain. It is a common practice there to plant a crop of 
early potatoes or other early truck, that is shipped North in June, and 
then to plant a crop of corn or cotton which will fully mature, 
though in case of the cotton the planting must be done between the 
rows of the early truck before the crop is shipped, but the corn can 
be planted after the potato crop has been shipped and will make a 
fully ripe crop. Since the truck crop is very heavily fertilized, there 
is always a residual amount enough for a heavy crop of corn, and if 
peas are sown among the corn the land loses very little fertility. 
But as we have said, corn is essential in any good rotation of crops 
in any part of the State, and over the larger part it is far more cer- 
tain than in what is called the corn belt of the Central West, where 
there is always a discussion as to the sufficient ripeness of the corn 
for seed, while in North Carolina, wnth no frost usually to check 
corn till late in October, and often into ISTovember, there is never any 
doubt about the full maturity of the seed corn. Where the corn is 
planted for the silo there is always time enough to get a crop of pea- 
vine hay from the same land, if the peas are sown among the corn 
at last working, and after the peas are mown the stubble is the best 
possible place for the small grain crops of wheat, oats, or rye, and, as" 
a pea-vine hay crop can always be cut after the harvesting of a small 
grain crop, it will be seen that our climate gives us special advan- 
tages in the getting of two crops in a season. In the piedmont sec- 
tion we have kno\^m. 75 bushels per acre of oats harvested and later 
in summer two tons per acre of the finest pea-vine hay made from 
the same land. 

IRISH POTATOES. 

Mr. Lindsay, who lives in Portsmouth, Va., but whose great plan- 
tation is in the drained area of the great Dismal Swamp, told re- 
cently the following anecdote: He said that recently there were 
several jSTorthern farmers looking about that section for land. One 
of them asked Mr. Lindsay if the Irish potato could be grown there. 
He told them that he usually shipped not less than 10,000 barrels 
ISTorth. One of his hearers was so much surprised that he said : "My 
friend, my wife, when I left home, gave me a little hatchet to give to 
the man who could beat me lying. I am about ready to hand it over." 
He really thought that Mr. Lindsay was telling a very big yarn, when 
in fact he has frequently shipped thousands of barrels over the 
10,000 ; and not only grows potatoes, but ships about 40,000 bushels 
of corn to Europe annually from his farm. The same soil that is 
found so productive of the Irish potato just over the Virginia line 
is found in greater areas in the coast country of Xorth Carolina from 
the Dismal Swamp southward, and as earliness in this crop is a mat- 
ter of great importance, the North Carolina growers have some 
weeks start of the Virginia planters. Some of the largest growers of 



10 Farming. 

Irish potatoes in the United States are found in eastern Xorth Caro- 
lina. 

Mr. Makely of Hyde County, whose soil occupies a similar deep 
bed of black vegetable mold as that of Mr. Lindsay, plants from 400 
to 600 barrels annually for the early market, and there are numerous 
growers who plant from 50 to 100 acres annually. The early potato 
crop is one of the crops of the gTeat trucking section, and the methods 
of culture will be more fully treated of when we come to practices 
of the truck growers. In the eastern section the Irish potato is 
grown primarily as an early crop for the JSTorthern market, and from 
seed of this early crop a late crop is grown for seed, for no truck 
farmer now depends on Northern seed potatoes for his crop. But in 
the plateau section in Henderson and Transylvania counties, and 
some other of the counties west of the Blue Kidge Mountains, there 
has grown up a gi-eat industry in the production of late potatoes and 
cabbages for the markets farther South, and great quantities of these 
are shipped every fall to Florida and other points in the lower South 
where they cannot so well be produced at that season. In these ele- 
vated mountain sections the climate approaches that of the Middle 
States, and the potatoes and cabbages are gTown after the ISTorthern 
fashion, and from their greater nearness to the Southern market the 
growers have a decided advantage over those farther JSTorth. 

SWEET POTATOES. 

The sweet potato in l^Torth Carolina is more of a general farm 
crop than the Irish potato. It is grown in all parts of the State, and 
while the varieties preferred in the J^orth are produced to some ex- 
tent by the market-gardeners of the eastern section, the greater part 
of the sweet potato crop is composed of the yam varieties that are 
preferred in the South to the dry ISTansemonds which are used in the 
N"orth, where people steam or boil them, a practice to which the 
softer yams will not submit. ISTorthern people coming South always 
bring with them their preference for a dry sweet potato, but it takes 
but a short experience with the sugary yams to convince them that a 
well-baked yam potato is far superior in sweetness to the dry yellow 
potatoes they have been accustomed to. The lighter grey soils of the 
piedmont section and the sandy lands of the coast are the best soils 
for the sweet potato, and with good cultivation it is not hard to grow 
a good crop, even as much as 500 bushels per acre. They are bedded 
in early spring and the sprouts set later as in other sections. But for 
the best potatoes for winter preservation cuttings are made from the 
tips of the vines in July, and are set in the same way as the early 
spring plants, and if the ground is moist hardly a cutting will at 
that season fail to grow. 

It has been found that these late potatoes, which are not so fully 
matured as those from the spring slips, will kee\) far better in winter. 



Faemixg. 11 

For small potatoes to bed in spring for the growing of plants cut- 
tings are made in August, about a yard long, and are planted in coils 
so that only the tip shows above gTOund. These coils make a mass 
of potatoes of small size, keep easily and arc far more economical of 
space in the bed, and each makes as many sprouts as a larger one. 
Sweet potatoes are grown largely for the feeding of hogs, and for 
this purpose the most productive varieties, which are not so much 
esteemed for table use, are commonly used, such as the Peabody and 
the Hayman or Southern Queen. The hogs are turned into the field 
to dig the potatoes for themselves, and with this crop and some 
others harvested in the same way, as we will mention, pork-raising 
can be done more economically in N^orth Carolina than in any of the 
gi'cat corn-belt States of the West. In fact, one large and successful 
farmer told us that the actual cost of his cured hams and bacon was 
four cents per pound. It is easy then to see that the raising of hogs 
and the curing of the meat can be made a very profitable industry in 
JSTorth Carolina. Far more home-grown bacon is now on the markets 
of the State than formerly, but there is still much of the packers' 
meat sold here, which could all be replaced by the home product to 
the profit of the farmer. Aside from their value as stock food there 
is in all the towns of the State a good market for the potatoes our 
people prefer, and there is also a good demand ISTorth for the varieties 
preferred there, and which can be more cheaply jn-oduced here than 
farther ]!^orth. 

CLOVER AJ^-D LEGUME CROPS. 

In all the red-clay uplands and in the mountain country the red 
clover of the North thrives perfectly on the more improved lands. 
The annual crimson clover is gTOwn with great success in all parts 
of the State, aiid in connection with the cow-pea makes a continuous 
winter legume crop after the summer growth of the pea. In all the 
State, and especially on the claj soils of the piedmont section, the 
Japan clover, Lespedeza striata, has spread over every vacant piece 
of land, and makes valuable pasture on lands useless for other pur- 
poses, since its best gTowth is made during the hot weather when the 
ordinary grasses are scorched by the sun. 

Alfalfa thrives with the greatest luxuriance in all parts of the State, 
and it is rapidly becoming one of the most important of hay crops as 
its treatment becomes better understood. For soil improvement and 
the acquisition of nitrogen from the air the so-called Burr clover has 
been found very valuable, especially in the coast plain. This belongs 
to the same botanical genus as the alfalfa, and its burr-like seeds have 
been found to carry with them the bacteria for inoculating the soil 
for the alfalfa. Another valuable legume crop, Avhich, like tlie Burr 
clover, will re-seed the land and bring another crop the following- 
fall, is the Hairy Vetch, Vicia villosa. This vetch, sown with wheat 
or oats in the fall, makes a very valuable hay crop and is off the 



12 Farming. 

ground in time to sow cow-peas for a second hay crop or to grow a 
crop of corn. 

But the gTeatest of legume crops, and the one especially adapted 
to Southern conditions, is the so-called cow-pea, Vig?ia catiang, which 
in numerous varieties is grown all over the State. Some of the 
earliest varieties will mature two crops in one season on the same 
land. But the early sorts are not so large hay-makers as the later 
ones, and, as the season is long enough over the gi-eater part of the 
State to mature any of them, the heavy growing sorts are to be pre- 
ferred to the bush varieties. With the cow-pea the farmer of North 
Carolina can accomplish as much the same season after a wheat or 
oat crop is cut as could be done with red clover in two years, and for 
the rapid improvement of the soil and the production of heavy forage 
crops, either for hay or for soiling green, there are few crops that 
can compare with it. The great advantage that the Southern pea 
has over red clover is that it can be used in the starting of the im- 
provement of a badly run-down piece of land, on which clover would 
hardly grow at all, for the pea will make a fair crop on land too much 
depleted to grow clover, and can be used for the purpose of getting it 
into condition in which clover and the grasses will thrive. But the 
cow-pea makes a hay of gTeater feeding value than red clover, and it 
is produced in such a short time that, except under peculiar circum- 
stances in the upper districts, it should be used rather than clover, 
as it enables the farmer to make a short rotation and more rapidly 
bring up his land while growing increasing crops of the sale crop. 
It has been well called the "Clover of the South," and no farm rota- 
tion in ISTorth Carolina is good that ignores the cow-pea. 

Another legume crop which has been found valuable, and which 
thrives in ISTorth Carolina far better than in the Korth, is the Japanese 
soja or soy bean. Many varieties of this, too, are grown, and in all 
the warmer parts of the State the taller-growing and later varieties 
are more valuable than the dwarf and early ones that succeed in the 
JSTorth. While hardly as valuable for the improvement of the soil as 
the cow-pea, the soy-bean makes a heavy crop of forage and is easily 
cured. It is also valuable for mixing with corn in the silo. 

Melilotus alba, or sweet clover, grows spontaneously all over the 
State, and though considered more of a weed than anything else, it 
has the same capacity for improving the soil through the fixation of 
the free nitrogen from the air that other legumes have, and it has 
also been found that the soil where it grows becomes inoculated with 
the bacteria that live on the roots of alfalfa, and it can be used for 
inoculating land for the growing of alfalfa. 



!N"o part of the country is better supplied with native grasses than 
North Carolina, and most of the grasses cultivated in the North thrive 



Farming. 13 

equally well here. While timothy, the great hay-grass of the North, 
does not thrive well in the warmer parts of the State, it is perfectly at 
home in the high mountain valleys and plateaus west of the Blue 
Ridge Mountains. The traveler from the ISTorth passing through the 
cotton country and seeing none of the gTass-fields he has been accus- 
tomed to at home, is apt to jump to the conclusion that gTass does not 
thrive here. The fact is that the chief effort of the cotton farmers 
for generations has been to kill grass, and with the least neglect in 
the early stages of the cotton crop it becomes hopelessly "in the gTass." 
The neglect of gTass has been the greatest error in the farming of the 
cotton country, for it will certainly thrive, as has been abundantly 
proved, where an intelligent effort has been made to grow it. The 
statistics of the Census Bureau show that for ten years past the aver- 
age hay crop per acre has been larger in jSTorth Carolina than in ]S^ew 
York or Iowa. And, though hay sells for three or four times the price 
here that it does in Iowa, there is but a trifling amount gTown as 
compared with Iowa. The gTeater yield here is not due to gTeater 
fertility of soil than Iowa, but to the greater rainfall and the longer 
season that permits more crops to be made. But as yet, with the 
exception of the fertile bottom-lands along the rivers and creeks, the 
southern upland country does not need grass; but docs need the 
legumes for the improvement of the soil and the making of hay far 
superior in quality to any grass hay. But on any land here in good 
heart one can count on fair crops of hay from orchard grass, tall 
meadow oats grass, Italian rye grass, and the fescues. 

For summer pasture we have the Bermuda grass, the finest of all 
the pasture gi'asses in a Southern climate. Xo grass in the North is 
more nutritious, and no gTass grown in the North has the same 
capacity for growing in the hottest and dryest weather of summer. 
While a nuisance in the cultivated fields, no North Carolina farm 
should be without a permanent pasture of Bermuda. When mixed 
with Texas blue-grass the pasturage can be kept up through the year, 
as the Texas blue-grass is a winter-growing grass, while the Bermuda 
thrives only during the heat of summer. Both together make the 
ideal permanent pasture for North Carolina; 

But our treatment of grasses would not be complete without men- 
tioning the most valuable volunteer grass of the South — the crab- 
grass. Those who know crab-grass only as a pest in the North can 
hardly realize its value here. On the fertile lands of the market- 
gardens of the coast plain, after the early crops are shipped North, 
the gTowers who want hay have only to level the soil nicely and let it 
lie, and the crab-grass grows with a luxuriance that would astonish 
those familiar with its puny and weedy growth in the North. We 
were passing a luxuriant field of crab-grass in the trucking section a 
few years ago, when our companion remarked that that hay crop 
would constitute the fourth crop from the field that season. He said 
that the field had been set in early cabbage plants the fall before. 



14 Farming. 

When the cultivation of the cabbages was completed snap-beans were, 
planted between the rows and the cabbages were cut and shipped. 
The beans were gathered, and after the cabbage stalks had been 
plowed under between the rows, in each alternate row musknielons 
Avere planted and the stripped bean-vines turned under; and as the 
vines of the melons spread so as to prevent cultivation the grass was 
allowed to grow, and its shade really helped the melons; and now 
there was on the land a growth of grass that promised two tons per 
acre of hay fully equal to the best timothy hay of the ISForth. In fact, 
in nearly all parts of the State one can get as much hay without 
sowing a seed as can be had under the most careful culture in the 
ISTorth. It is this ease of living that has been responsible for a great 
deal of the careless farming in the South. In a limited section in 
Davie County we have been assured that 128 different species of 
grass have been collected, and in the black peaty soils of the coast 
plain the rank profusion with which grass grows on every vacant 
spot indicates well what could be done there with well-bred cattle. 
With the legumes that thrive in ISTorth Carolina as they thrive no- 
where north of us, and the wonderful profusion of native grass, the 
State could in all its sections soon become a stockman's paradise if 
devoted to that. What is needed here is diversified farming and 
farmers who have been accustomed to farm systematically. 

DIVERSIFIED FARMING. 

This is the greatest need of jS'orth Carolina and of the whole South. 
Our people, left penniless after the war, were compelled to use every 
effort to get means. Cotton cultivation offered the readiest way, for 
on the cotton crop only could money be borrowed. Hence, with tlie 
aid of commercial fertilizers, they became a community of planters 
of cotton and tobacco rather than farmers, depending on the one crop 
for everything else, even for the mules that cultivated the crop, and 
for the meat that fed the hands. ISTorthern farmers, seeing the ruin 
wrought by the constant curtivation of cotton year after year on the 
same land, are apt to imagine that cotton was the cause of this. 
Incidentally, of course, it was; but really the wasting of Southern 
soils has been due to the method and not to the crop. There is no 
crop grown that so readily fits into an improving rotation as cotton — 
at least, none that more readily does so, though the old idea was that 
cotton must always be a planter's and. not a farmer's crop. But there 
is a very marked improvement, and the leaven of improved farming 
is working all over the State as people see the advantages of diversi- 
fied and systematic cropping. The long dependence on commercial 
fertilizers for the growing of cotton has led our people to think that 
for every crop grown there must be some special fertilizer mixture, 
and one of the most important lessons to be learned is that with a 
good rotation of crops and the use of the legumes they can save more 



Farming. 15 

than half the cost of the fertilizers while growing increased crops for 
sale. 

INTENSIVE FARMING. 

Possessing wide areas of land, the Southern people have been ex- 
tensive planters rather than intensive farmers. The effort of the 
cotton planter was to see how many acres he could cultivate to the 
mule, rather than how much labor he could profitably expend on an 
acre. The growth of the market-gardening industry in the eastern 
section of the State has shown the value of intensive culture, and the 
market-gardeners are giving' to the farmers lessons on the intensive 
cultivation of the soil. With acres and acres of land covered over- 
head high enough to work horses under, with iron pipes through 
which a steam-pump forces the water for the irrigation of the fields, 
and a cropping in winter and summer that keeps the land producing 
income during the entire year, which our climate allows, the truck 
farmers are second to none in the United States in the intensive use 
of their land. And, as we have intimated, something of this inten- 
siveness is practicable in the gTeater part of the State by reason of the 
long season. The trucker of the east will plant cotton between the 
rows of his early potatoes on which he has been lavish in the use of 
fertilizers, and will get a crop of potatoes running up at times, to 100 
barrels per acre or more, and then a crop of more than a bale of 
cotton per acre. The strawberry grower takes two crops of berries 
from his land, and then he, too, plants cotton on the turned-under 
strawberry sod and makes a fine crop. Or, he may plant a corn crop 
after the strawberries are shipped and sow peas among it, and, after 
the corn is off, have the finest of pasture for stock. The cotton and 
grain farmer^of the upper country sows peas after his small gi-ain is 
harvested, and cuts the heavy hay crop the same season, and can 
leave the stubble sown with crimson clover for a hay crop the next 
spring in time to plant corn or cotton. In fact, the long growing 
season offers to the wise farmer opportunities for the intense cultiva- 
tion of a few acres that cannot bo had in a more northern climate. 
In this work of diversifying and intensifying the agriculture of the 
State, the College of Agriculture and Mcclianic Arts at Raleigh, the 
Agricultural Experiment Station, and the Department of Agriculture 
with its test farms in various parts of the State, are all working with 
zeal and energy, and the new-comer to the State can always depend 
upon them for information and advice in the cultivation of the soil. 



FRUIT CULTURE. 



Owing to the great range of climate in the State of North Carolina 
there is a great range for the cultivation of the various fruits. Fruits 
of most sorts flourish in all parts of the State, but certain regions are 
better adapted than others to the production of certain fruits in a 
commercial way. Therefore, we will treat of each separately, taking 
first the small fruits as grown for home use and for market. 

STRAWBERRIES. 

So far as the-growth and perfection of the fruit is concerned, there 
is no section of the State where the finest of strawberries cannot be 
grown. But in the cultivation of this fruit for market we must take 
into consideration the fact that the strawberry is grown commercially 
in all parts of the country, and that each section, from Florida to 
Maine, has its own season in the market. Hence, to make straw- 
berries profitable for shipment ISTorth, they must be grown where the 
climate is early enough to put the product into the market before the 
localities north of us come in with shorter hauls and cheaper freight. 
Hence, in our high mountain country the crop will be anticipated by 
localities on the coast north of us, and the shipment could not be 
made profitable northward, though it may yet be possible to create a 
Southern market for the product of the mountain country, where the 
fruit can be grown in the greatest perfection. Present conditions, 
however, have confined the culture of the strawberry as a commercial 
croj) to the lands of the coastal plain, where climate and* soil combine 
to make the business a very profitable one. In fact, the first really 
fine berries sent ISTorth are those from Columbus County in this State, 
Of course, earlier in the season, strawberries come from Florida and 
other more southern sections, but there are none of them equal in 
quality to those produced in the counties of Columbus, Duplin, and 
Wayne, in IsTorth Carolina. From a small beginning but a few years 
ago the business of strawberry growing along the Atlantic Coast Line 
Railroad has increased to great proportions and thousands of car- 
loads are annually shipped North, Chadbourn, in Columbus County, 
is a settlement of Michigan people who colonized there nearly twenty 
years ago, and who, by their energy and thrift, have developed a 
large business in strawberry and truck farming, and are reaping 
large profits. About the towns of Mount Olive and Faison, on the 
Atlantic Coast Line, the strawberry business had its first start, and 
the soil there has been found to be well adapted to the production of 
the finest fruit. 

Great improvements have been made of late in the marketing of 
the strawberry crop. The fruit is now all sold at the stations for 



^A 



- ^W^Kl^ 



r»'^f5t?TS«^W^ 




In the Berry Fields. 



Feuit Culture. 17 

cash to the iN'orthern dealers, who distribute the cars to the various 
!N'orthern markets, and this system has been found to be more satis- 
factory than when the individual growers shipped to commission 
merchants in the cities and took all the risks. 

While strawberry growing is the leading interest in some sections, 
it is by no means the only culture, for in the same sections large crops 
of early Irish potatoes, gTeen peas, and other crops are produced and 
shipped North. Then, too, the climate allows of much double crop- 
ping. For instance, between the rows of early potatoes, when the 
cultivation is completed, cotton is planted, and when the potatoes are 
dug in June the cotton cultivation goes on, and often very large and 
profitable crops of cotton are produced after a profitable crop of pota- 
toes has been sold from the same land. In like manner the straw- 
berry plantation is allowed to bear two crops, and is then plowed 
down, as soon as the second crop is gathered, and cotton planted at 
once on the land. Or, after the strawberries, a crop of peas can be 
sown and cut for hay in time to plant the same land in a second crop 
of Irish potatoes from seed of the early crop. This second crop is 
now used entirely for seed for the early crops the following season. 

There is still much room for the development of the strawberry 
culture, for the demand for berries of high quality is always good 
and is annually increasing with the increase in population northward, 
and even with an excess there would be room for large canning estab- 
lishments to compete with California in fruit packing. 

While the coast region will always be the section where profitable 
strawberry growing for the Northern market will be carried on, the 
increase in the to^vns of the State makes home markets for a great 
deal of the fruit, and makes the culture of the strawberry profitable 
to many in all parts of the State who never ship a crate North. In 
fact, the home markets are apt to be overlooked and poorly supplied. 
The valley lands of the mountain section produce strawberries of the 
finest quality, and, as we have suggested, they may be the source for 
supplying a gi-eat trade with the far South in these berries or in can- 
ning them. 

EASPBERRIES. 

Raspberries, like strawberries, can be gi'own in every section of the 
State, but are far better adapted to the upper piedmont and mountain 
sections than to the warmer parts of the State. In the eastern section 
the raspberry will never be of commercial importance, since the cli- 
mate is too warm for the largest crops and the fruit does not bear 
long transportation like the strawberry. In all the eastern and 
warmer sections the raspberry needs to be grown in the richest and 
most moist clay soils, and, while not needing winter protection as in 
the North, it needs shade and careful cultivation to carry the plants 
well through the long summer, and, with the red varieties, especially, 
the crop is not near so large as in the North and in the upper sections. 



18 Feuit Cultuee. 

Bnt in no part of the country (Joes the raspberry thrive better than 
in the valleys and plateans of the mountain country, where soil and 
climate combine to make it fine and productive. And in moist clay 
soils in the upper piedmont section the raspberry thrives finely and 
can be made profitable for the local markets. 

DEWBEEEIES AIvD BLACKBEEEIES. 

Our native dewberry is small, though early, but is never grown to 
any extent for market. But the larger form, the Canada dewberry, 
has been found to be among the most profitable of small fruits. The 
variety of the Canada dewberry known as the Lucretia is the only 
variety cultivated. While it is grown to some extent in the coastal 
plain, the section where the culture of dewberries has grown most is 
in the edge of the lower piedmont and mainly about the town of 
Eidgeway, a settlement of Northern people, where, on a red-clay up- 
land in Warren County, dewberry culture has grown to large propor- 
tions and has proved profitable. The fruit goes into market before 
strawberries ripen in the ISTorth and makes a variety in the fruits on 
the market and usually brings a good price. In fact, the cultivation 
of the Lucretia dewberry is extending annually. Instead of, as for- 
merly, training to wires, which were found to chafe and injure the 
canes, the running stems are now tied up in spring to stakes and the 
new canes are allowed to run on the ground during the first season, 
and are safer there in winter than tied up, so that the tying-up is not 
done till spring. x\fter the crop is off the old canes are cut away and 
the new ones trailed along the rows out of the way of cultivation. 

The later and upright-growing blackberries are also grown to a 
considerable extent and over a wider territory than the dewberry. 
In fact, there are numerous varieties of wild blackberries in all parts 
of the State from which as fine sorts as those in cultivation could be 
selected. This is particularly true of the mountain and upper pied- 
mont sections, where blackberries of the finest quality grow so pro- 
fusely that little attention has been given to their cultivation. The 
earliest blackberry grown for market is the Early Harvest, a rather 
small and sweet variety of wonderful productiveness, Avliich comes 
in often before the dewberries are over. The finest fruit is from the 
Wilson, but some growers claim that, though the Wilson sells for a 
higher price, the gTcater productiveness of the Early Harvest will 
make it more profitable. Here, too, there is much room for growing 
dewberries and blackberries for the local markets, which are as yet 
not well supplied and depending very largely on the wild berries. 

WliOETLEBEREIES OE BLUEBEEEIES. 

Xo attempts that we know of have been made to cultivate these, 
but the wild crop is of great commercial importance in some parts of 
the State, and in Sampson County the "Sampson Blues" have a great 



Feuit Cultuke. 19 

reputation and form an important crop from the swamp lands, the 
shipment amounting to perhaps a hundred thousand doHars annually. 



Peaches are grown in all parts of the State, but commercially in 
only a few sections. Peaches of remarkably fine quality are produced 
in the upper piedmont section and on the dryer ridges in the moun- 
tain country. But little has been done in these sections beyond the 
supply of the local markets. Peach-growing on a large scale has 
developed mainly in the long-leaf pine section, the sand-hill country 
in Moore County, where immense orchards have been planted and 
where the business is increasing. In this section there has never 
been a total failure of the crop, and the peaches produced on these 
sandy soils are high-colored and of fine quality. Inasmuch as lands 
in that section arc the lowest in price of any in the whole State, it 
would seem that with the railroad facilities, which are abundant, a 
large business should grow up in peach culture as well as in some 
other fruits. Those interested in peaches should visit the great 
orchards near Southern Pines, on the Seaboard Air Line Railroad, 
in the peach season, and note there the great development that is 
being made. As with other fruits, the later and finer peaches that can 
be produced in the mountain section should find a profitable market 
in the South. 



Pears thrive well everywhere, but especially in the coast region 
and the upper piedmont and mountain sections. In all parts of the 
State the LeConte and the Iviefi:'er, the hybrids, with the Chinese 
pears, thrive, and the Kieffer especially is a far better pear here than 
in the North. It gTows here to a larger size and ripens more per- 
fectly than northward, and for canning it should be made a very 
profitable fruit. Where proper care is given, all the finer pears 
thrive in the coast country and in the mountains, too, better than in 
the intermediate section. Xo finer pears are grown anywhere than 



Where properly cared for all the species of plums thrive in any 
section of the State. The finer European sorts demand higher cul- 
ture and greater care in fighting the curculio, but they can be grown 
to perfection, while the native sorts, and especially the Japanese 
varieties, thrive in the greatest profusion and with the most ordinary 
care, and their shipment Xorth can be made very profitable. 



20 Fbuit Cultuke. 



QUINCES. 



In moist soils near the coast and in the moist lands of the mountain 
valleys quinces thrive well. In fact, they can be grown in any sec- 
tion, but their best locality is near the salt water and on land natu- 
rally moist. Commercially they are of less importance than other 
fruits, but 'in all parts of the State a home supply can be easily 
grown. 

CHERRIES. 

The finer sweet cherries cannot be grown to any extent in the 
warmer parts of the State. The trees grow and are perfectly healthy, 
but they fail to produce crops. The Morelloes and other sour cherries 
thrive all over the State, and the finer cherries thrive in great per- 
fection in the tipper piedmont and mountain sections, and cherries 
from the Brushy Mountains of Wilkes County have brought in the 
JSTorthern markets prices but little less than the California product; 
and in that part of the State, if the crop is handled after the Cali- 
fornia style, the cherry ought to be made a very profitable crop. 



' Grapes of all the cultivated sorts thrive in North Carolina in every 
section, and in all the warmer parts of the State the Vitis Yulpina, 
the class of grapes to which the Scuppernong belongs, thrives in 
greater perfection than it does in almost any other section of the 
country. 

The varieties of the Labrusca and other cluster gTapes, commonly 
cultivated northward, thrive well in every section, and it has been 
found that by grafting the European Vinifera grapes on the roots of 
these varieties they can be grown here in the open air with success, 
both in the mountain country and in the east. The largest commercial 
vineyards are in the long-leaf pine section in the neighborhood of 
Southern Pines, in Moore County. There the sandy soil seems to be 
well suited to the grape as well as the peach, and the Delawares and 
ISTiagaras grown there are unsurpassed in beauty and quality by the 
same varieties grown elsewhere. 

Eastern ISTorth Carolina is the home of the Scuppernong and other 
varieties of the Vulpina class of grapes. Owing to the fact that they 
do not ship well, these grapes are almost unknown to the IsTorthern 
j)eople, and, being so different in character to those they have been 
accustomed to, it takes a IvTorthern visitor some time to acquire a 
liking for them. But a little experience with this class of grapes 
soon makes the new-comer fond of eating them. It has been demon- 
strated that the Scuppernong is the finest wine grape in America 
to-day. The making of Scuppernong wine is on the increase as the 
proper management of the wine is better understood. The Garrett 
Company of Halifax County is now making many thousands of gal- 




Note the Difference ! Done with Strawbekries in a few Years. 



Eeuit Culture. 21 

Ions of the finest Sauterne and other classes of wines, and there is no 
reason why eastern l^orth Carolina should not compete on even terms 
with California in the making of wine, and wine of a far better 
and lighter character than the wines of California. 

ORCHARDING IN GENERAL. 

Of course, the apple is the great orchard tree, and while apples can 
be gTOwn with success in all parts of the State, the cultivation of 
winter-keeping apples on a commercial scale will always be confined 
to the mountain country west of the Blue Eidge and the more elevated 
lands in the upper piedmont section. In the mountain country apples 
have long been grown with gTeat success, though with little attention 
on the part of the grower. The Cherokee Indians in the southwestern 
part of the State raised a great many apples from seed. Some of 
these have gotten into the nurseries and are esteemed, but there are 
still a great many of the old seedling apples in the mountain country 
which are worthy of cultivation. Apples have been grown in the 
mountain country in spite of almost absolute neglect, simply because 
of the admirable adaptation of the soil and climate to the apple. 
Some years ago there was a specially full exhibit of apples at one of 
the State Fairs, and three of the best judges of fruit in the country 
were selected to judge them. These were Professor Bailey of Cor- 
nell University, Mr. Taylor, who was afterwards superintendent of 
the horticultural exhibits at the St. Louis Fair, and Mr. Brackett, 
the Pomologist of the Department of Agriculture in Washington. 
Mr. Brackett declared that such fruit was grown only in two sections 
of the United States — ISTorth Carolina and the Ozarks of Missouri 
and Arkansas — and that North Carolina had the advantage not only 
of her position nearer the Eastern markets, but that her mountain 
soils are very fertile, while those of the Ozarks are very poor. With 
the extension of railroads into the mountain country and some liber- 
ality on the part of the roads in the matter of freights, the cultivation 
of apples will grow to an immense business in western North Caro- 
lina. Here and there large orchards are being planted and cared for 
in modern style, and the example of these will spread through the 
section. 



MARKET-GARDENING WITH KITCHEN VEGETABLES. 



The greatest development of late years in jSTorth Carolina has been 
in the production of early vegetables for the i^orthern markets in the 
eastern coastal plain, and in the production of late vegetable crops in 
the mountain section for the Southern coast markets. Both these two 
distinct lines of vegetable culture are grov^ing, and the growers are 
intensifying their work and getting gTeater returns per acre than 
ever. Both the soil and climate of the coast plain are well adapted 
to the production of early vegetables, and with the adoption of frames 
protected with cloth or glass, and sonietimes with steam-heating 
pipes, the production of crops in winter and early spring is carried 
on with great success, and large areas are now irrigated by means of 
pipes running overhead high enough to work teams under. With 
rapid transportation to the jSTorthern cities by rail and water, the 
business of supplying early vegetables to the growing JSTorthern cities 
is certain to increase beyond its present large proportions. The lead- 
ing crops grown by the eastern market-gardeners are as follows : 

IKISII POTATOES. 

The Irish potato is one of the leading truck crops grown for the 
early market, and also as a second crop for the winter market and 
for seed. From the city of 'New Bern alone over 100,000 barrels of 
early Irish potatoes are shipped annually, and the crop in other sec- 
tions is a very large one. One growler in Hyde County plants 600 
barrels for the early crop, and from these he grows a second crop 
sufficient for his next year's supply of seed potatoes and many bar- 
rels to sell. The early potato crop is planted in February and goes 
to market in June. This gives time to grow a crop of pea-vine and 
crab-grass hay on the land and then have it ready to plant the second 
crop of potatoes from seed of the first crop in August. This second 
crop is dug in December and makes the best seed for the following 
spring, as the potatoes keep sound and unsprouted during the short 
time they are out of the ground, and gTow with a vigor never found 
in the seed brought from the liorth. 

In some sections it is the practice to plant cotton between the rows 
of early potatoes at the last working of the crop, and when the pota- 
toes are dug and shipped the cultivation of the cotton is continued, 
and the heavy fertilization of the potato crop insures a heavy crop of 
cotton, too, and in this way, after shipping a profitable crop of pota- 
toes, there is often a bale or more per acre of cotton grown. But, for 
the welfare of the truck crops, it is always better to follow the early 
crops with peas for hay. On the heavil,y manured soil the natural 




Lettuce for Early Market 



Maeket-Gakdening with Kitchen Vegetables. 23 

crab-grass grows rapidly in warm weather, and this, mixed with the 
peas, makes the best of hay, and the presence of the crab-gTass makes 
it easier to cure the peas. In the mild winter climate of the coast 
country the late crop of potatoes can be piled in windrows and 
covered with earth. Some growers lift them when the early potatoes 
from Bermuda come in, and, being fresh from the soil, they sell as 
'^Isew Bermudas" in New York, bringing from $2.50 to $5 per 
barrel. 

cabbages. 

The only cabbages grown for market in the coast trucking region 
are the early cabbages, which can be shipped North in March and 
April profitably. The variety used is generally the Early Wakefield. 
The seed are sown in early September and at intervals till October, 
so as to have plants just the right size to set the last of November or 
early December in the open field. The plants are set on heavily 
fertilized ridges, and it is important that the plants be just old enough 
and not too old, as the plants that have gotten too large in the fall 
may run to seed in the spring without heading. The cabbages are 
shipped in crates that hold about a barrel and are among the most 
profitable and largely grown crops of the market-gardens. There is 
another large cabbage interest in the mountain country, where the 
late summer and fall cabbages are grown and shipped in August and 
September to the Southern coast cities — Charleston, Savannah, and 
Jacksonville — where the climate is not favorable to the growing of 
the late cabbages. Several counties are engaged in this culture, the 
most extensive being in Henderson County. But in all the mountain 
counties the late cabbage crop is of great importance, as the climate 
there is more favorable to their growth than in the warmer parts of 
the State, and the eastern to^vns of the State furnish a market for 
a gTeat deal of this cabbage. The late crop of cabbages in the moun- 
tain counties probably amounts to one hundred thousand dollars, 
while the early crop in the eastern part of the State will reach over 
half a million dollars in value. 

lettuce. 

This is now probably the most profitable crop gi'own by the truckers 
in the coastal plain for the area planted. It is grown entirely during 
the cool season of fall, winter, and early spring. It is grown almost 
entirely in frames covered with cotton cloth, though some use glass 
sashes. Some of the larger gi'owers use steam-pipes to heat the 
frames on very cold nights, and have irrigating pipes above the 
frames for watering. Two crops are grown, one being cut about the 
last of November, and the other, set at that time, is marketed in ]\rarch 
and April. The lettuce that is cut the last of November is followed 
by beets for the early spring market, and these by cucumbers and 



24 Makket-Gaedening with Kitchen Vegetables. 

second-crop potatoes till time to set lettuce again. In this way the 
soil is kept growing something every day in the year, and as this 
intensive work costs heavily to prepare the frames and to manure as 
heavily as this sort of cropping requires, so the profits are corre- 
spondingly larger than the more extensive work of the open field, 
and it is not rare to get $3,000 an acre from the winter lettuce- 
growing. 

KALE AND SPINACH. 

These are sown in the early fall for shipment as greens during the 
winter and early spring. A very severe winter IsTorth which kills 
these crops there will at times make the kale and spinach crops very 
profitable. Kale, being the hardier and more productive, sells for a 
lower price than spinach, but as both are cheaply grown and only 
occupy the land during the cool season, and enable the trucker to 
keep some hands at work ready for the spring and to take care of the 
lettuce frames, the greens crop is usually fairly profitable, and some 
think that in seasons when the shipping is not profitable it pays to 
grow these crops merely to turn under in the spring. 

stbing-beans ok snaps. 

These are very largely grovm by the market-gardeners, and, when 
early, they pay very well, as they are cheaply gTown, need light fer- 
tilization and are out of the way in early summer, so that a hay crop 
of peas and crab-grass can be grown on the same land, the dead bean 
tops helping to fertilize the .land. Muskmelons are sometimes planted 
between the rows in alternate rows and the bean vines turned under 
for their benefit after the beans are shipped, and these followed by a 
volunteer crop of crab-grass hay or by the second crop of Irish pota- 
toes, for no market-gardener is satisfied with less than two crops 
annually on his land, and often gets three or four, for the second-crop 
Irish potatoes can be at once followed by the early cabbage crop from 
plants set in December. 

ENGLISH PEAS. 

The early crop of English peas is a very important one to the 
market-gardener in eastern North Carolina. The main crop of the 
extra earlies is usually sown in January and goes to market late in 
April and early May. Single growers will often plant a hundred 
acres in peas. They are a cheaply-grown crop and are soon off the 
land, and the vines turned under are valuable for the improvement 
of the soil and can at once be followed by some later crop, such as 
cucumbers or melons. 



This crop is not as yet very largely grown in the eastern trucking 
section, but it can be made a very profitable crop on the peaty re- 



Maeket-Gabdening with Kitchen Vegetables. 25 

claimed swamp lands by planting in the late fall so as to have the 
crop come in in the later spring months after the Northern crop is 
over. In the moist bottom-lands of the piedmont section celery gTows 
finely, and in the cool valleys of the mountain country it attains a 
quality far superior to the big pithy celery that is so largely gTown in 
Michigan and shipped over the country. The home markets of the 
State and of the Southern cities in general are poorly supplied with 
fine celery till the late crop from Florida comes in, and a very profit- 
able industry could be added in the mountain country in growing 
celery for the home and Southern markets in winter. It is an 
expensive crop to grow, and the gardeners in the eastern section find 
it more profitable to devote their attention to the lettuce crop. 

cucumbers. 

The cucumber crop is getting to be a very important one to plant in 
the cloth-protected frames as the lettuce is cut out and shipped, and, 
being protected there from late frosts, it comes on early and the crop 
is shipped North till the price falls, and then the growers have im- 
mense tanks, holding about fifty barrels each, in which the remainder 
of the crop is put into brine and later sold to the picklers, and the 
second-crop Irish potatoes occupy the land till time to set the lettuce 
again for the spring crop. A thousand bushels per acre is a common 
crop of cucumbers. 

MUSKMELONS OR CANTALOUPS. 

These are sometimes grown in the same way as the cucumbers to 
get an early crop, but are commonly planted in large areas following 
a crop that is taken off in early spring or planted while that crop is 
still gTowing. Only the very early varieties of small size, like the 
Netted Gem or Rocky Ford, are grown, as these are more in demand 
than the large kinds and are easily packed in crates. 

CAULIFLOWERS. 

These, like the early cabbages, are set in the fall, but are not so 
largely grown. Sometimes they are set in the frames and the remain- 
ing space filled in with lettuce and the cauliflower given the full 
room as the lettuce is cut out. Grown in this way, they come into 
head in March and can be made quite a profitable crop. 

tomatoes. 

Tomatoes are not largely grown by the market-gardeners in the 
eastern section. When the plants are forwarded under glass and set 
early, so that the first fruits ripen the first of June, they can be profit- 
ably shipped; but later the crop is seriously damaged by sun-scald 
and the plants are liable to blight. Hence, the crop is not there con- 
sidered a profitable one. In the western part of the State, and 



26 Makket-Gakdening with Kitchen Vegetables. 

especially in the mountain country, tomatoes thrive in great luxuri- 
ance and of the finest quality, and, if grown there on a large scale, a 
profitable canning industry could be built up, as the conditions there 
ai-e more similar to those in the gi'eat canning sections northward. 

LIMA BEANS. 

The general humidity of the climate in the warmer sections of the 
State forbids success with the navy beans which are grown in the 
N'orth, but" the introduction of the bush forms of the lima bean opens 
up an opportunity for the profitable culture of these fully equal to 
that which has been so profitable in California. The beans gTOwn 
here should be of the small or butter-bean type, as the large limas are 
unproductive except in the cool mountain valleys where the conditions 
more nearly resemble those of the North. 



Onions are largely grown for bunching and shipping as green 
onions, and this culture can be made very profitable, since the sets 
planted in the fall will be ready in the eastern section for market, 
often in February, and always in March and April. The yellow 
potato onion can also be profitably grown as a ripe onion, as it comes 
in from fall-planted sets in the early part of summer, before any 
Xorthern-grown onions are ripe, and usually brings very fair prices. 
In the mountain country the bottom-lands are very well adapted to 
the cultivation of onions from seed. The finest Prizetaker onions we 
have ever seen were grown near Asheville and brought to a Farmers' 
Institute at Biltmore some years ago. Seed sown there in frames in 
winter and transplanted to the open ground later grow to an immense 
size, such as ^are often seen in crates at the green grocers' as Spanish 
yellow onions. But there is no part of the State where good onions 
cannot be grown the first season from the seed if they are sown early. 

ASPARAGUS. 

This is an important crop to the truck growers of the eastern coast 
section, where on warm sandy soil the crop comes early and brings a 
fancy price in the N'orthern markets. North Carolina asparagus is 
a standard article in the Northern markets and is a profitable crop 
when well gTown. But asparagus for home use and home markets 
can be grown all over the State, and the local markets are rather 
poorly supplied and offer a good market for many sections of the 
State. 



Extra early beets are grown in the lettuce frames following the 
cutting of the November crop of lettuce. They are also grown to a 



Markbt-Gakdening with Kitchen Vegetables. 27 

considerable extent from seed sown in Febrnary in the open ground, 
which make beets for bunching in May. 

WATERMELONS. 

These are gTown, of course, in all parts of the State, but for 
I^orthern shipment mainly in the eastern and lower piedmont sec- 
tions. On light sandy soils the crop is usually a profitable one, both 
for shipping and for the home market, and melons of immense size 
and fine quality are produced. 



CLIMATES. 



We say climates rather than climate, for in North Carolina there 
are various climates. 

In the high j)lateaiis of the northwestern part of the State, where 
the forest growth is white-pine, hemlock, and fir, one might imagine 
himself in Canada. In this section — the counties of Ashe, Alle- 
ghany, and others — the farms lie generally over 3,000 feet above the 
sea-level, and gTass and live-stock are the leading interests. From 
these lofty elevations the State slopes to the sun and the sea, and 
there is a series of climates all the way to the lower coast, where we 
find the first tall palm-tree growth in the forest. From white-pines 
and hemlocks to palms indicates a wonderful range of climate, and 
hence a wonderful range of capacities for the production of different 
crops, from the blue-grass of the northwestern corner to the palms and 
sugar-cane of the southeast section. 

THE MOUNTAIN SECTION. 

This is the region west of the great escarpment of the Blue Ridge, 
in which are found the highest mountain peaks east of the Rocky 
Mountains. It is a region of fertile valleys and elevated plateaus, 
with a climate very similar to that of the Northern Middle States. 
The summers are cool and pleasant and the whole region is an 
attractive one to the summer visitor and is becoming a great summer 
resort. The winters are cold, but shorter than those of the Middle 
States North. In most mountain regions the mountainsides are 
rocky and sterile, but in the mountains of North Carolina, as a rule, 
the mountain -slopes are covered with fertile soil and in some parts 
of the mountain country the treeless "balds" have their slopes to 
their lofty tops covered with fertile soil and rich grasses, on which 
great herds of cattle are grazed in summer. The valleys in the 
southern section of the mountain country are less elevated and the 
climate is mild and pleasant, while the snowfall is very light. The 
clear streams of water that flow everywhere and tlie natural growth 
of fine grasses mark this region for cattle and the dairy, while on 
the uplands fruit of all kinds flourishes as it seldom does elsewhere. 
It is destined to be the most noted apple-growing section in the whole 
country. Apples from the mountain country have twice carried off 
the first prize at the Madison Square Garden in New York City in 
competition with the whole United States. Peaches attain a color 
and quality there which they do not reach in the lower country. They 
grow as handsome as the California peaches, and as to quality the 
California product is hardly to be named in comparison with them. 



.{ 









^ 




** -A— #-— « 




-S^c- 




On the Atlantic Beach, Wilmington. 



Climates. 29 

In short, the mountain country is admirably adapted to dairying and 
fruit-growing and homes — 

"Where the wing of life's best angel, 
Health, is on the breeze." 

THE PIEDMONT SECTION. 

This section properly extends from the foot of the Blue Eidge to 
the line of hills some hundred or more miles eastward, which make 
the falls of the rivers that run from the mountains to the sea. This 
eastern limit is a series of elevations rising in some places to over 
1,000 feet above the sea and known by various names, as the Uwhar- 
rie Mountains, Hickory Mountain, Occoneechee Hills, and Kouge- 
mont, and it extends from the South Carolina line to the Virginia 
line. Between this line of hills and the Blue Eidge is a rolling 
country of hill and dale and river and valley, with their fertile bot- 
tom-lands. In this section the two tiers of counties south of the 
Virginia line are mainly devoted to the production of the famous 
gold-leaf tobacco, which is produced in E'orth Carolina better than 
elsewhere. Southward of these counties the leading crop is cotton. 
The whole section is evidently naturally fitted to diversified farming, 
with grass, grain, and cotton, with cattle to consume the abundant 
hay crops that can be produced. The climate of this region, sheltered 
from the northwest blast in winter by the high mountains west, is 
far milder in winter than the mountain country west of the Eidge. 
The snowfall in winter is light — even lighter than the sections east 
of it, because of the lesser humidity of the climate — and there is 
hardly a day in winter when farm work in the soil cannot go on. 
The soils of this section are largely the result of the decomposition 
of granitic rocks forming the deep beds of blood-red clay. Here and 
there this red clay is overlaid by a gTay and lighter soil, the tobacco 
soil of the country. The red-clay lands are admirably adapted to the 
cultivation of wheat, and when well improved gi-ow gi*eat crops. On 
the red-clay soil of this section the late Governor Holt made on an 
80-acre field 4 6 14 bushels of wheat per acre, and the same well- 
improved farm makes great crops of cotton, corn, and hay. Thousands 
of acres of similar lands are waiting for the systematic farmer to go 
to work to bring out their capacities. There is no section where deep 
plowing and subsoiling produce greater results than on these red-clay 
uplands, for the piedmont red clay is all good soil down to the fast 
rock, when once aerated and frosted by the winter, and there are 
thousands of farms nominally worn out that only need a man with 
energy enough to break into the fertile farm that lies right under 
the scratch made by the little one-horse plow of by-gone days. With 
careless cultivation and shallow plowing these hills are apt to wash 
into gullies, but with deep plowing and proper level and shallow cul- 
ture there is less danger of this. With one of the most delightful of 



30 Climates. 

climates and blessed with health, there is no reason why the surplus 
lands of this section should not become the homes of many thousands 
more successful farmers than now, when the large farms are divided 
ujD and properly cultivated. The main line of the Southern Railway 
runs through this section, with branches east and west in all sections, 
so that railroad transportation is excellent. At almost every station 
one sees cotton mills in operation, and at High Point, a town which 
has grown in the past fifteen years from a hamlet of 300 people to 
a city of over 7,000, there is the largest woodworking industry in 
the whole South. All these factories are taking men who were for- 
merly on the farms, and are opening markets in all sections for gar- 
den and farm products to feed these people, for every cotton mill 
means quite a village to be fed by the surrounding farms. The pied- 
mont section is a high rolling plain, rising from an elevation of about 
GOO feet on its eastern border next the hills to about 1,500 feet at the 
foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It has the finest water-powers 
of the State, which are slowly being utilized for manufacturing and 
electrical power for the cities around. The soil is naturally good and 
retains the improvement that is easily added by good farming. Its 
chief lack is farmers — men who will take up and make homes and 
improve the surplus lands, which as yet are low in price, but rapidly 
advancing. 

THE CENTRAL SECTION. 

This comprises the undulating country extending from the hills 
that mark the outline of the piedmont country proper to the falling- 
off of the uplands to the level coastal plain. This is sometimes called 
the lower piedmont. In general character of soils it resembles the 
true piedmont country, but the soils are more generally sandy and 
gravelly over the red clay, though in many sections the same red clay 
forms the surface soil. From its lesser elevation the winter climate 
is slightly warmer than that of the upper piedmont section. On the 
southern end of this section we come to the great long-leaf pine belt, 
the sand-hill region, which, beginning in North Carolina, runs south- 
west through South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louis- 
iana, and into Texas, an extended region of sand-hills supposed to be 
the ancient dunes of the seacoast when the lower country was not 
elevated above the Atlantic. This was for generations regarded only 
for its product of turpentine and tar, and later for its lumber. But 
of late years it has grown into a region for winter resorts, at first by 
consumptives, who found the balmy air and dry soil favorable, and 
many of whom, finding that they could live in comfort there and 
could not do so in the N'orth, settled permanently and built up the 
town of Southern Pines. Making homes there, these people natu- 
rally wanted to grow something. The deep sandy soil had always 
been considered too barren for any cultivation. But it was soon 
found that with proper fertilization the soil was admirably adapted 



Climates. 31 

to the production of fine grapes. Later on, large enterprises were 
started in the cultivation of peaches, and now immense vineyards 
and orchards are found in various sections, and their number is 
increasing, as the cultivation of the peach especially has been found 
profitable. Later on, the sand-hill country attracted the attention of 
Mr. Tufts of Boston, who assumed that the mild winter climate and 
the pure water would make a resort for people who were simply tired 
and not sick. He therefore built the town of Pinehurst in the midst 
of thousands of acres of pines, and it has gi'own into a very popular 
winter resort, as consumptives are excluded. There are a number of 
hotels of different sizes and prices, and many cottages that are rented, 
and the visitors in winter now number thousands. At Pinehurst, too, 
out of the needs of the winter guests, there has been developed the 
fact that winter forcing in green-houses under glass could be made a 
very profitable part of the horticulture of this section. The surplus 
cucumbers from the Pinehurst forcing-houses have sold during the 
past winter in Raleigh at fifteen cents each. With our abounding 
sunshine in winter, the forcing of vegetables and small fruits in hot- 
houses can be made far more profitable than in the ISTorth because of 
the greater sunshine and less amount of coal needed. Every gar- 
dener knows that sunshine under glass counts for far more than fire 
heat and costs less. In fact, the beginning made in frames by the 
gardeners of the eastern section in the winter culture of lettuce is but 
the entering wedge that \vill introduce regular winter forcing in 
North Carolina. The upper part of the central section has for 
generations been mainly devoted to the one crop of cotton, and, as a 
consequence of this clean and constant culture and shallow plowing, 
the hilly lands have washed badly and need protection by terrace 
banks, at least till by deeper plowing and subsoiling and the rotation 
of crops adapted to the increase of humus in the soil the inclination 
to wash is lessened. The soil is naturally easy to improve and to 
keep up if proper farming is done. Cotton and tobacco will always, 
probably, be the leading money crops of this section, though on some 
of the lighter soils the cultivation of watermelons for shipping is 
increasing. Fruits for home use can be easily grown, but the condi- 
tions outside the sand-hill country are not favorable to commercial 
fruit culture. But the climate favors the production of the finest for- 
age crops in the form of cow-peas, soy-beans, and alfalfa. Alfalfa has 
been very successful in this section, and its cultivation is rapidly ex- 
tending. Few cattle have been kept in this section heretofore, but with 
the increase of forage crops there will naturally come more attention 
to stock. The markets in the towns and cities are not well supplied 
with butter of fine quality, and there is a constant demand for beef in 
the larger towns, a part of which has to be supplied from abroad, 
though as good beef can be gro^^^l here as anyAvhere, with the proper 
attention. The winter climate is peculiarly mild and less humid than 
that of the coast plain. Occasionally the temperature in cold waves 



32 Climates. 

falls down iu the teens above zero, but the mean winter temperature 
is far above the freezing point and zero is unknown. This section 
was originally covered with a vast forest of oaks, remnants of which 
are still found here and there in giant trees, especially in the capital 
city of Kaleigh. But the second growth following the destruction of 
the original oak forest is largely of pine, which has been Nature's 
cure for man's waste. All the section north of the sand-hills is well 
adapted to general farming with grain in rotation with peas and 
cotton, and with good farming there is no money crop in the United 
States that can compare in profit with cotton. Good farmers in this 
section can make a bale or more of cotton per acre, though the general 
average is much less. JSForthern men coming South are too apt to 
want to ignore the cotton crop, thinking that the deterioration of the 
soil has been due to the culture of cotton, when in fact there is no 
crop that makes a lighter demand on the soil when properly culti- 
vated in a good rotation, and none that admits of a more rapid and 
profitable improvement of the soil through the growing of legumes 
and the feeding of live-stock. In this climate the expensive barns of 
the North are not needed to protect cattle, for they can run out most 
of the time and find pasture, except in the coldest weather, and 
then open sheds furnish all that is needed. As has already been 
stated, on all the red-clay soils of the State the Lespedeza striata, 
known as Japan clover, has spread and furnishes an admirable 
summer pasture on lands 'otherwise waste. Mr. French, who came 
and settled in Rockingham County from the blue-grass pastures 
of Ohio, and has gone into the breeding of Polled Angus cattle 
with great success, stated recently in a public address that he 
found that the Japan clover gave him a better pasture than the 
blue-grass in Ohio, for it is at its best in the hot weather of sum- 
mer when the blue-grass is parched and dried. With abundant 
summer pasture and the wonderful forage crops that can be grown 
for hay in the shape of cow-peas, vetch, and soy-beans, it should be an 
easy matter to raise the finest of cattle in all the upland country of 
North Carolina. County after county in the piedmont section is 
being cleared of the fever ticks and being admitted north of the 
National quarantine line, and as this is done the raising of cattle for 
the Northern trade is becoming more profitable. For general grazing 
the grassy plateaus of the northwestern mountain section are equal 
to any in the whole country, and thousands of cattle of high grade 
are now raised there and sent west as feeders, the great elevation of 
the farms there precluding the profitable cultivation of com. But 
in all the southern part of the mountain section the milder climate 
admits of wonderfully fine crops of corn, while the mountain balds 
furnish the summer pasture, and the markets southward for the 
finished cattle are inexhaustible. 



Climates. 33 

the coastal plain. 

This section extends westward from the seacoast for a hnndred or 
more miles. It is a level and generally a sandy soil elevated but 
little above the sea and blessed with a winter climate of peculiar 
mildness from the proximity of the gulf stream, whose warm waters 
skirt the coast to Hatteras. In this section are found the great 
swamps or pocosons extending from the Great Dismal Swamp on the 
Virginia line to the southern extremity of the State. In this section 
cotton was for many years almost the sole crop, but in recent years 
the cultivation of tobacco has largely extended. But the greatest 
development, as we have seen, is in the great market-gardening indus- 
try that has sprung up and is rapidly growing both in the culture of 
vegetables and of small fruits, especially the strawberry. The At- 
lantic Coast Line Railroad runs through this section, and, with its 
branches, furnishes rapid transportation for the perishable products 
of the gardens. With a climate that is below the freezing point in 
winter only occasionally, the work of the farm and garden can be 
carried on continuously, and with the intensive methods we have 
mentioned the winter cropping is becoming a feature of great impor- 
tance. Where the lands adjacent to the great swamps have been 
drained they have been found of great fertility. In Hyde County 
many years ago the cutting of a canal from Lake Mattamuskeet to 
the Pamlico Sound opened up a body of l^nd surpassing in fertility 
the black prairies of the West, and all over this section there are 
bodies of black and fertile soil underlaid by a compact clay which 
makes them retentive of any improvement that is applied. In addi- 
tion to the development in the market-gardening line there has, in 
this section, grown up an allied industry which is unique in its way 
and found nowhere else in the country. This is the cultivation of 
flowering bulbs for the IS^orthern florists. It was found years ago 
that the soil and climate were peculiarly adapted to the production of 
the tube-rose bulbs. These are gi'O^^m there to such perfection that a 
limited section along the Atlantic Coast Line, centering at the town 
of Magnolia, now supplies all the tube-rose bulbs for the ISTorthern 
and European markets. Of late years the tube-rose growers have 
turned their attention to other flowering bulbs and tubers, and there 
is a large acreage now devoted to the gladiolus, canna, ealadium 
esculentum, dahlias, narcissus, and Roman hyacinth, and it is be- 
lieved that the lily known as the Bermuda lily, and which is now 
imported in immense quantities from Bermuda, can be profitably 
produced there. Experiments in this line are in progress. Bulbs 
are also being produced on Roanoke Island, and the industry is ex- 
tending. The level character of the soil of this whole section, the 
absence of rocks and hills and the generally light nature of the soil 
render cultivation easy, and, while there are poor and sandy soils, 
the general character of the soil is one of great natural fertility. 



34 Climates. 

On the moist black lauds grass grows spontaneously and in great 
variety, and on the hea^dly manured lands of the trucking section 
wonderful volunteer croi^s of hay are made from the crab-grass after 
an early crop of vegetables has been shipped, and here, too, the cow- 
pea, "the clover of the South," flourishes as it does nowhere else. 
Cattle winter without any care at all in the great swamps, feeding 
on the evergreen reeds of the cane-brakes, and come out in the 
spring in good order and are soon ready for market. Man.y hundreds 
of the common scrub cattle of the section are thus pastured in winter, 
and with improved cattle and the abundant forage that can be grown 
there should grow uj) an export trade in cattle raised right near the 
ports from which they are shipped. 



CATTLE AND DAIRYING. 



There is a gradual improvement in cattle in all parts of the State, 
In that part of the mountain section where stock-gTazing has long 
been the leading interest the short-horn blood prevails, and most of 
the cattle show evidence of a short-hora cross. In the neighborhood 
of the cities there is an increase of attention to the dairy, and some 
are making gTcat success with it. For this purpose the Jersey and 
Guernsey cattle and their gTades are used, with here and there some 
Holstein blood. For beef cattle in the piedmont section the Polled 
Angus cattle are taking the lead and have been found well adapted 
to the section. But there is great room for more improved stock 
and more improved methods of stock-feeding and dairying. Butter 
can be produced here more cheaply than in the North and sells for a 
higher price, wdiile the city markets are as yet poorly supplied all 
over the South, and get a great part of their sup])lies from the Xorth 
and West, all of which could be profitably produced here. 



SOMETHING ABOUT THE SCUPPERNONG GRAPE. 



A Fine Wine Grape that Promises Much as an Investment— Best 
Eeturns for Outlay of Any Crop. 



The Scnppernong will grow and produce grapes on any of the 
sandy lands of eastern North Carolina. 

Cuttings may be secured in gi-eat quantity by taking any Scnpper- 
nong vine and letting it fall on the ground in June and throwing a 
few shovelfuls of dirt on it at from two to three feet from the outer 
ends of the limbs. These take root quickly in the fresh ©arth, and 
can be taken up and cut off any time from November 1st to March 
1st, and set out. Care should be used in selecting thrifty vines with 
nice grapes, as the vine reproduces the kind. Seedlings are not 
worth planting, as you do not know what kind of grapes they will 
produce. 

The land should be laid off in rows twenty feet apart, the vines 
being set out twenty feet apart in the rows, and planted true and 
square. A good post standing out of the ground not less than seven 
feet should be set to each vine. These should be of cedar, oak, or light- 
wood, as the setting of new posts cuts the roots off the vines. A good 
cutting will reach almost to the top of the post in one year, if prop- 
erly cared for. The best method is to wire the vines. When this is 
done rows of posts, well braced, have to be set out around the edge of 
the vineyard, to which are attached the larger wires. Down each 
row a 'No. 10 galvanized wire is run as a governor wire, and stapled 
to the top of each post. Across these governor wires you stretch at 
first one No. 14 wire. If well braced at the ends this gives all the 
posts secure bracing. As the vines grow and spread out, you add on 
each side of the No. 14 wire other wires, always keeping good arbors 
for the vines to run on. The vine should not be allowed to bunch up 
in knots, but be kept spread out and growing uniformly in all direc- 
tions. It takes 108 vines to set out an acre properly laid off. 

The land should be cultivated with leguminous crops, and the 
vines kept free from trash around the roots, which grow close to the 
top of the ground. Do not cultivate under the branches, as the roots 
extend and draw sustenance as far as the branches run. Hence, if 
you plow close to the vines, you tear up the roots. The best method 
we know is to keep the roots, all around the body of the vine and as 
far as the branches extend, mulched with a heavy coat of leaves and 
straw. The home of the vine is in the piney woods, where, in the 
rich virgin soil, it spreads hundreds of feet. The best vines we have 
ever seen were in old garden plots where they were never plowed, 
but the weeds kept down. A good plan is, perhaps, to have sheep 
graze under the vines ; but the best plan is to keep in cultivation the 




GRAI-KS GKoVS I.N PUDFL'SION E\KKVUI1KKI 



The Scuppernong Grape. 37 

land not shaded, and to keep the Aveeds down on the rest by having 
a heavy mulch. While the vine will grow and produce on light sandy 
land, yet it should not be expected to get good crops from poor land. 
The soil should be well fertilized, as for peaches. We do not believe 
in plowing deeply or close to the vines. It breaks the roots and 
inevitably damages the vines. 

As to gathering, the preferable plan is to gather by hand, and in 
small vineyards this can be done. But in a large vineyard this is not 
practicable. Poles are attached to strong sheets made of canvas, 
each about ten feet square, and with leather handles and a man to 
each side of the sheet, it is easily carried around between the posts, 
which are set in even rows. Another man or boy, with a forked stick, 
shakes the vine gently just above the sheet, and the ripe gTapes fall 
and are caught. Children pick up the few gi-apes which fall outside 
the sheet. The vines should not be beaten hard, as not only do you 
thus get gTeen fruit, but damage the vines by breaking the tender new 
gTowth, which produces the crop next year, or most of it. The leaves 
can be fanned out by a fan-mill or picked out by hand ; a fan-mill is 
best, and can be moved along as you go over the vines. The vines 
should be gone over as often as the grapes ripen, as you cannot gather 
all the gTapes at one time without getting green or overripe fruit, 
either of which lowers the grade of grapes. 

A word as to profit. x\n acre will, at three years old, with good 
care, produce about one ton of gTapes. At four years old it should 
yield from three to four tons of grapes ; at seven years from planting 
the acre should produce from eight to ten tons of grapes each year, 
and this yield should continue indefinitely, or rather as long as proper 
care is given the vineyard, as the life of the Scuppernong is more 
than a hundred years. 

The present price per ton of grapes, in good condition, is $25. 
These find sale at the wineries. of this and adjoining States. Were 
the grapes more plentiful the price would be less, say from $15 to 
$18 a ton. This will give some idea of the profit to the gTower, and 
when the expenses of setting an acre and maintaining it in bearing 
condition — a total failure of the Scuppernong crop has never been 
recorded — are considered, no crop of any kind will give equal returns. 

Xorth Carolina has in the coastal region many thousands of acres 
which would produce this crop, and many farmers would find it a 
safe investment, and one which in time would lessen the anxieties of 
declining years, by the annual sales from twenty or more acres in 
this fine wine grape. 



NORTH CAROLINA THERMAL BELTS. 



The Great Fruit and Veg-etable Zones!— High, Dry, Healthful Region. 



More than forty years ago Silas McDowell wrote in the Agricul- 
tural volume of the Patent Office Eeport an article relating his 
observations in Macon County. He was a man of much intelligence, 
and had been in youth a companion of John Lyon, the English 
botanist, exploring with him the Black, Yellow, Roan, Grandfather, 
and Linville ranges, and caring for him until his death in 1814. 

Mr. McDowell was also a companion of Curtis, Buckley, Rein- 
hardt, and Dow, the latter of whom perished among the mountains, 
and his remains were never discovered. Dr. Gray was in communi- 
cation with him more than forty years ago. 

He "wrote: "When I commenced business it was as a farmer in 
western K'orth Carolina, in a wnld valley and amid lofty mountains, 
and for nearly fifty years my house was an open free home to the 
scientist, particularly the geologist and botanist (my own specialties). 
But now the light begins to burn dim in the binnacle, and is nearly 
out." He died in 1882, at the ripe old age of 87. Honor to his 



memorv 



A description of the phenomena observed by him is given in his 
own words : "Amongst the valleys of the southern Alleghanies 
sometimes winter is succeeded by warm weather, which, continuing 
through the months of March and April, brings out vegetation rapidly 
and clothes the forest in an early verdure. 

"This pleasant spring weather is terminated by a few days' rain, 
and the clearing up is followed by cold raking winds from the north- 
west, leaving the atmosphere of a pure indigo tint, through which 
wunk bright stars ; but, if the wind subsides at night, the succeeding 
morning shows a heavy hoar-frost ; vegetation is utterly killed, includ- 
ing all manner of fruit germs, and the landscape clothed in verdure 
the day before now looks dark and dreary. 

"It is under precisely this condition of things that the beautiful 
phenomenon of the 'Verdant Zone' or 'Thermal Belt' exhibits itself 
upon our mountainsides, commencing at about three hundred feet 
vertical height above the valleys, and traversing them in a perfectly 
horizontal line throughout their entire length, like a vast green ribbon 
upon a black gTound. 

"Its breadth is four hundred feet vertical height, and from that 
wider, according to the degree of the angle of the mountain with the 
plane of the horizon. Vegetation of all kinds within the limits of 
this zone is untouched by frost; and such is its protective influence 
that the Isabella, the most tender of all our native grapes, has not 



WoETK Cakolina Thermal Belts. 39 

failed to produce abundant crops in twenty-six consecutive years ; nor 
has fruit of any kind ever been known within these limits to be frost- 
killed, though there have been instances where it has been so from 
a severe freeze. The lines are sometimes so sharply drawn that one- 
half of a shrub may be frost-killed while the other half is unaffected. 

"This belt varies in the height of its range above different valleys. 
I will name a case in point. I made my observations in relation to 
this belt in Macon County, which is traversed by the beautiful valley 
of the Little Tennessee Kiver lying 2,000 feet above tidewater. 
Here, when the thennometer is down to 26° the frost reaches 300 
feet vertical height. A small river, having its sources in a high 
plateau 1,900 feet above this, runs down into this valley, breaking 
through three mountain barriers, and consequently making three 
short valleys, including the plateau, rising one above the other, each 
of which has its own vernal zone, traversing the hillsides that en- 
close them, the first of which takes a much lower range than that 
of the lower valley, and each taking a lower as the valleys mount 
higher in the atmosphere, and in the highest one the range of the 
belt is not more than 100 feet above the common level of the plateau, 
a beautiful level height containing 6,000 acres of land and lying 
3,900 feet above tidewater. 

"The country on the Atlantic side of the Blue Ridge sinks rapidly 
by a succession of long sunny slopes reaching down into the plain 
or level country. Along these slopes the air is pure and dry, a 
refuge for the consumptive, as diseases of the lungs have never yet 
been known to originate among the inliabitants of these dry, fogless 
mountains, and here also does the gTape find a most salubrious climate 
and congenial home." 

Another similar belt is found along the eastern slope of the Tryon 
Mountain range in Polk County. 

Said Dr. L. R. McAboy of Linn, in this county : "The belt along 
Tryon Mountain is some eight miles long and extends from 1,200 
feet above tidewater to 2,200 feet, thus being about 1,000 feet in 
width. This begins at the very base of the mountain, and extends 
up till you have attained the full height of the Blue Ridge, say of 
Ashevjlle, Buncombe County, with an elevation where the belt is 
most perfect, of about 1,500 feet. 

"The observed facts of temperature are truly strange. The mer- 
cury falls in summer and rises in winter, when compared with either 
the top or the base of the mountain, so much so that travelers on the 
highway through the belt perceive the difference without the aid 
of a thermometer. This difference is greater at night than during 
the daytime, being 5° to 10° on the summer nights, and 15° to 20° on 
winter nights. There is very little dew, generally none perceptible, 
which accounts for little or no frost. 



40 NoKTH Carolina Thermal Belts. 

"The flora is grand. The azalea there, instead of being a shrub 
four feet high, attains a height of 10 to 20 feet, and exhibits every 
shade of jiink and orange. 

"We are in latitude 35°, but for all practical purposes 3° south of 
our geographical position. The leaves 'of plants, shrubs, and flowers 
remain untouched by frost until the latter part of December, and 
sometimes till the middle of January, when they are killed by snow 
or sleet. The early spring in the belt admits of planting any vegeta- 
bles the first of February without risk from frost. Tomatoes, tobacco, 
and other tender plants remain gi-een until after the middle of De- 
cember. Fig trees live through the winter unprotected, and bear full 
crops, while in the valley they are killed to the ground every winter. 
Grapes never mildew nor rot, and are of large size and delicious 
flavor. This belt is confined within distinct and well-defined limits, 
which remain the same from year to year, and in the middle stratum 
of air or land on the mountainside." 

Another writer says : "After a snow-storm not a particle of snow 
will exist in the belt (it melts as it falls), while the tops and sides of 
the mountains above, and the valleys below, will be covered." 

Prof. John Le Conte said : "I wish to put on record the results of 
observations made by me many years ago on the ^frostless zones' of 
the flanks of the mountain spurs adjacent to the valleys in the Blue 
Ridge. My observations were made at Flat Rock, near Henderson- 
ville, Henderson County, a well-watered, fertile, mountain plateau- 
like valley, which is about 2,200 feet above the sea-level. 

"My own observations, and the information elicited from resi- 
dents, seem to indicate the following facts: The zones in question 
are not exempt from frost during the whole of the cold season ; in fact, 
during the winter the ground in these belts is frequently frozen to a 
considerable depth, but during the spring months they are conspicu- 
ously and uniformly frostless." 

It seems, then, to be an established fact that, at these three points, 
in three different counties, there are some noteworthy meteorological 
conditions prevailing along this belt of 400 to 1,000 feet of perp'endic- 
ular height, and it seems probable that a similar state of things exists 
in kind, if not in degree, on all the southern and eastern slopes of 
parallel mountain ranges in that latitude where protected against 
wind. 

Respecting the explanation of these phenomena, Mr. McDowell 
theorizes as follows : "Heat is ever radiating from the earth, and in 
cold, clear, still nights it mounts upward through the cold, damp 
air, taking from it its caloric, while the latter rushes down in a cold, 
frost-producing current, and hence the lowest ground in a valley is 
ever subject to the hardest frosts. 

"The warm, dry, light current keeps mounting upward like cork in 
the water, until it reaches a stratum of atmosphere too thin and light 
to support it, when it consequently falls back and potirs its warm, dry. 



North Carolina Thermal Belts. 41 

genial stratum upon the top of the lower or frost stratum ; and hence, 
on cold, frosty nights, is produced the phenomenon of the 'Vernal 
Zone.' " 

Of course such a phenomenon must be explained in general upon 
the theory of the nocturnal stratification of layers of the atmosphere, 
having different amounts of moisture and caloric, of which we so 
often see examples when the mist settles in the valleys at a given 
level, which, if the temperature be sufficiently low, would also be 
the frost line, or when often, on a summer's day, from a mountain- 
top the white cumuli may be seen stretching away in long lines at a 
well-defined altitude. But in these cases we have no such visible and 
exact demarcation of the warmer stratum on its upper side. 

Prof. Le Conte, already quoted, says: "The ^frostless zones' coin- 
cide with the nocturnal and morning 'fog-belts' of the spring months. 
The uniform pressure of these white circumscribed belts of fog on 
the flanks of the mountain spurs during the early morning hours 
imparts a striking feature to the scenery of these valleys. When 
illuminated by the bright morning sim they appear like girdles of 
cotton-wool of moderate width, encircling the peaks at the height of 
200 or 300 feet above the adjacent valleys; and their cumulus-like 
whiteness, contrasted with the verdure above and below them, is no 
less striking than it is beautiful." 

The latter circumstance seems to furnish an explanation of the 
physical cause of the so-called "Thermal Belt" ; for the constant 
fogs at night and in the morning not only prevent refrigeration by 
obstructing terrestrial radiation, but, during the condensation of 
vapor in the process of fog-formation, there must be developed an 
enormous amount of heat just at this zone. Why this condensation 
of aqueous vapor should be so persistently restricted to a belt of only a 
few hundred feet in vertical thickness is a question much more diffi- 
cult to answer. The observations of intelligent residents of the moun- 
tain valleys in the southern divisions of the Appalachian chain will 
doubtless verify or dis])rove the general coincidence of the "frostless 
zone" with the "fog-belt." 

This piedmont region, not merely that section technically so-called, 
but the zone along and around the southern Appalachians having an 
elevation from 1,000 to 2,500 feet above sea-level, possesses attrac- 
tions as regards beauty and grandeur of scenery, fertility and variety 
of soil, equability and salubrity of climate, not to be surpassed in the 
Union. 

If, in addition, these thermal belts exist and extend generally 
among those ranges, offering exemption from certain forms of dis- 
ease, with exceptionally favorable facilities for fniit culture, a knowl- 
edge of the facts should be more generall.y diffused. 

These facts point out this region as the best place to be found for 
the cultivation of celery, cauliflower, tomatoes, and other vegetables 
for canning; raspberries and strawberries for shipment and preserv- 



42 North Carolina Thermal Belts. 

ing; for peaches, pears, j&ne apples, cherries, quinces, and currants; 
also for the finer table and wine grapes. All of these are known to 
flourish in the mountains and are distinguished for crispness, flavor, 
and color. Irish potatoes, pumpkins, turnips, beets, parsnips, car- 
rots and the like also grow to perfection. 



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